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There are backup catchers around the league, who have a lot of experience and would be productive additions to the Giant's roster. Gerald Laird was the first who came to mind, but he's on the DL too. Pudge Rodriguez is probably available.

There are a few other catchers that might make sense for SF.
Astros: JR Towles and Jason Jaramillo. Houston is going nowhere and Castro (on the DL) is the catcher of the future.
Blue Jays: Jose Molina is a free agent after the season, and JP Arencibia looks like the real deal.
Brewers: Wil Nieves could be available as LuCroy and Kottaras are 1&2 in Milwaukee
Cubs: might move Koyie Hill if Wellington Castillo convinces them he can play
Dodgers: wouldn't mind them trading Barajas away and letting Ellis show if he can play
Mariners: Adam Moore deserves a shot to play. Miguel Olivo could be offered up
Mets: Love themselves some Josh Thole, so Ronny Paulino could go
Pirates: They would let Ryan Doumit go for cheap
Yankees: Sabean loves him some old dudes-Posada?

That nightmare crossed my mind immediately, but then it struck me that Sabean would never go for Posada, not while Bengie Molina is wallowing around out there as an unsigned free agent.

Which would also be a nightmare, but probably a less costly one.

Bengie Molina sickened by Posey injury, says Giants should be “smart enough” to make him an infielder, and “heck yeah” he could catch if Giants call | Extra Baggs (http://blogs.mercurynews.com/extrabaggs/2011/05/26/bengie-molina-sickened-by-posey-injury-says-giants-should-be-smart-enough-to-make-him-an-infielder-and-heck-yeah-he-could-catch-if-giants-call/ - broken link)

Quote:

To be quick, I’ll just transcribe the whole interview. But here are the bullet points:

–Molina said “heck yeah” he could put on a uniform tomorrow, but he realizes he’d probably need a few weeks in the minors first to get in game shape. He would “put his mind” into returning and go to the minors if the Giants really wanted him to do so. But he has not received a call from the Giants, and he’s not expecting one because he perceives hard feelings from the front office at how his tenure ended.

Two games tonight that I'm especially interested in. The first is the Colorado Rockies vs the St. Louis Cardinals.

Rockies' rookie Juan Nicasio makes his major league debut against the Cardinals. Nicasio is a 24 year old right-hander making his first major league start. Nicasio is 5 - 1 with a 2.22 ERA in AA thus far. More importantly he has 10.01 K/9 and just 1.59 BB/9. Nicasio does a decent job of getting ground balls but his percentages have been decreasing at each level:
A - 49%
Hi A - 45%
AA - 42%
Nicasio throws a mid-90's fastball, slider and change up.

Pitching in the bigs against a potent Cardinals offense (117 wRC+; 2nd in baseball) is a big jump for a guy who was pitching in High A Ball last season.

The second game features another young pitcher, Michael Pineda. I reviewed Pineda's review here. Pineda was very good that day, and has been even better since. Pineda is 6 - 2 with a 2.16 ERA for Seattle in 9 starts. He's striking out 9.41/9 and walking just 2.16/9. His 2.26 FIP is better than every starter's in baseball not named Roy Halladay or Matt Garza.

He is showing the left/right split that I was concerned about:
vs L: K/9=8.78, BB/9=2.36, HR/9=.68
vs R: K/9=9.95, BB/9=1.99, HR/9=.28
He's just been so good that it hasn't mattered.

I was concerned about his change up not being good enough to get out left-handed batters. He's responded by only throwing it 6% of the time. His run value per 100 change ups is slightly negative, but only -.22.

He's thrown his fastball (62%) and slider (32%) much more often. Both of those pitches have been excellent. His fastball has been worth 1.69 runs per 100 pitches while the sider has been worth 2.93 runs per 100 pitches. That's the 8th best fastball and 12th best slider amongst starters.

Tonight he faces a challenge. The New York Yankees and their #1 (118 wRC+) offense. He gets a bit of a reprieve though, as the game is in cavernous SAFECO field and not New Yankee Colosseum. SAFECO is particularly hard on left-handed batters, which the Yankees have plenty of (Granderson, Cano, Gardner and switch hitters Teixeira, Swisher and Posada), with an 86 park factor for home runs according to StatCorner.

The other day I turned to FSS (fox sports south) to watch a Braves game, it turns out I was a few minutes early, because "in his own words Greg Maddux" was airing, so I watched the last few minutes.

Chipper Jones starts telling a story about his rookie season 1993, not to far into the season and he's still trying to prove he belongs on the team,

there's a popup out in front of homeplate and Chipper comes charging in and plows right into Maddux, Greg gets up and says "good going Larry now stay the **** away from me If I'm over here you stay the **** over there.

Chipper was laughing his head off while he told the story, and I was ROFLMAO

I hate the Reds! I hope Votto and Gay Bruce catch one right in the ear hole!

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